Chapter 11

 Du Mingna couldn't forget that he had just seen Dora yesterday.

 He wanted to be friendly to Dora, but he heard about Dora screaming and crying.

 The little girl seemed a bit timid.

 Indeed, the little girl spoke reasonably and did not slander him for bullying after her father arrived, but her crying really scared him.

 At this moment, seeing the little girl right in front of his own door, he didn't dare to move forward.

 Fortunately, there was Old John and the villagers who helped with moving things back, finally there were witnesses, so he didn't need to worry about being misunderstood as a bad person who bullied the little girl again.

 Du Mingna breathed a sigh of relief, his pace that had just slowed down became a bit faster.

 The little girl, upon seeing him return, her originally bright eyes sparkled even more.

 The little girl ran swiftly.

 She was about to run in front of Du Mingna and the others, then quickly stopped and stood upright.

 She was Dora.

 Unlike yesterday when she had been playing wildly for most of the day, getting herself dirty all over, Dora looked exceptionally cute and well-behaved at this moment.

 "Young Master!" Her voice was clear and pleasant.

 She greeted Old John, the villagers who helped with moving things, her sweet voice warming people's hearts.

 Old John and the others all smiled and greeted her.

 Du Mingna also responded with a friendly smile.

 "Dora, hello.Are you playing here?" However, in Du Mingna's eyes, Dora didn't seem to be playing at all, more like... waiting for someone?!

"No!" The little girl shook her head, her bright big eyes filled with anticipation, "I'm waiting for Young Master to come back." "Oh?" Du Mingna raised an eyebrow, "You're waiting for me to come back?" The little girl nodded very seriously.

 With her childish demeanor, such actions made her look like a child pretending to be an adult, increasingly adorable.

 "Young Master, I want to go to school! My father asked me to come find you together tonight, but I couldn't wait, I wanted to learn from Young Master today..." Dora's voice gradually lowered.

 She nervously squeezed the grass doll in her hand.

 "Young Master, am I too hasty? Is Young Master busy with something?" As she spoke, she startled herself, her tone becoming panicked.

 "I'm sorry, I should have come back tonight, I... Young Master, please pretend you didn't see me, okay?" She said, ready to run.

 Du Mingna instinctively reached out to stop her, but afraid of scaring her, he discreetly retracted his hand.

 "Dora, wait!" Fortunately, Dora finally heard him speak.

 Dora stopped, turned around to look at him.

 Even the villagers who were helping with moving things temporarily put them down and looked at Du Mingna.

 Their heads were almost touching.

 They all heard it! Dora was waiting outside Du Mingna's door to learn from him.

 And Daniel, had he really told Dora to come find Du Mingna to study together tonight? What was going on? The villagers knew about the promise Du Mingna had made yesterday, some of them were tempted, but no one had thought of actively trying yet.

 Now it seemed like Daniel was pretending to dislike Du Mingna, but secretly moving forward? What a Daniel! They would have to interrogate Daniel properly when he came back from the mountain! Du Mingna didn't know what the villagers were thinking.

 He showed his most sincere smile to Dora.

 "It's okay, Dora, you've waited so long.

 Don't you want to learn? Perfect, I had these uncles bring back some clay and sand for making writing boards, do you want to make a writing board with me first?" Du Mingna had never thought of doing all the writing boards by himself.

 The number of people coming to learn now was still small, but what about in the future? Doing it all by himself? When would he finish! It's faster when everyone works together.

 As for whether Dora, who is still young, can successfully make the writing board as he wishes? He doesn't care much.

 He just wants to keep Dora now.

 This is a child who doesn't need to do much farm work now and should be quite free every day! If nothing unexpected happens, Dora can also become a long-term student at his school.

 Then the progress of the task can be improved again, right? What can students learn at school? Cultural courses such as reading and writing should be learned, but can't handicraft courses also be learned in the same way? Dora just ran away, just afraid of disturbing him, making him unhappy, it doesn't mean that Dora is unwilling to do anything other than learning to recognize words by his side.

 Sure enough, when he heard his question, Dora became radiant.

 "Writing board? What is that? Young master, I am willing to do it with you!" The villagers who came back with things looked blankly at the clay and sand at their feet.

 Just these things, which are still quite common in their village, can also be related to writing? Isn't this too magical? The work in the field is not particularly urgent.

 One of the villagers shouted first, "Young master, do you want us to help?" Du Mingna glanced at them and nodded.

 "Then thank you.

" With someone's help, he can try to make more versions made by burning earlier.

 The clay board after burning will definitely be harder, and there is no need to worry about it breaking when used.

 However, the specific method still needs to be explored.

 Fortunately, it's still relatively early now, there is still time.

 With more villagers working, Du Mingna's progress in making the writing board has clearly accelerated.

 Dora was on the side, thinking of helping very seriously.

 She is still a little young, and her help is limited.

 Other villagers are also not very willing to let her work, more giving her some clay to play with on her own.

 Dora played with the clay for a while, imitating Du Mingna and others, pressing the sticky mud in her hand into a cake shape, then pinching the edges of the cake, trying to make the edges higher.

 At this point, she wanted to pick up the sticky clay, but when she tried, some clay came up with her hand, while some clay stuck to the ground and didn't want to come up.

 She pulled hard, but only made the whole piece of clay longer, breaking the original shape.

 Dora was dumbfounded.

 She looked at what she had made, then at what Du Mingna and others had made, almost suspecting that they were not using the same material.

 Some villagers noticed Dora's expression and kindly gave her some pointers.

 Although the villagers had not tried to make such things with clay, their life experience was richer.

 They could already think of using things like dry grass to support the clay, so that when the formed clay is picked up, it would be supported by the dry grass to maintain the shape of the clay.

 However, Dora directly placed the wet clay on the ground, with a large contact area between the clay and the ground, so it was not easy to pick up.

 Du Mingna looked at the villagers' approach and thought of using molds.

 He had not yet burned this kind of red clay with fire, and did not know if it was possible to make things like porcelain.

 He temporarily did not think of more uses for these things, but perhaps he could tell his ideas to the villagers and let them experiment.

 If the villagers had results, he should also benefit.

 Experimentation is definitely not something that can be completed in one or two tries.

 If he is too stingy with his ideas, he won't know when he will be able to bring out everything he wants in the future.

 Porcelain is still a bit far off.

 The higher priority is paper.

 Dora received a reminder from the villagers and re-kneaded the lump of clay she had brought to play with.

 But the clay had dried out a bit, then re-wetted, and when kneaded again, the appearance was not as good.

 Dora accidentally added too much water, and the clay didn't look well-formed.

 She was a bit discouraged, and a villager immediately sent her to fetch firewood.

 Of course, there were also villagers who went with her.

 The children in the village were not so delicate, young in age, and could do what they could, and they were quite happy doing it.

 Dora's attention was diverted by her new job, and she happily went to fetch firewood with the villagers.

 Writing board that Du Mingna was thinking about was relatively simple, but he still worked with the villagers until nearly dusk before finally finishing the writing board.

 During this time, there were villagers working in the fields who, seeing that the villagers who were supposed to help with carrying things had not arrived, ran over to check the news.

 When they saw it, these villagers almost didn't want to go back to the fields, but were persuaded by other villagers to reluctantly go back and inform the other villagers of the news, and then come back to help with the writing board.

 When he came back again, he deliberately brought some more clay.

 Whether Du Mingna needed so much or not, it was definitely not wrong to bring it back! He also wanted to work on things together, so he had to bring his own materials.

 Some villagers who heard the news he passed on also rushed over from the fields.

 Du Mingna, seeing the crowd, briefly mentioned the uses of the clay he knew.

 He told the villagers that he had read about it in books before.

 The villagers were not clear about the situation, thinking that the books in the city really contained such information, and they were all amazed.

 Du Mingna also praised the villagers for their initiative, as some villagers were already thinking of making a kiln.

 The kiln could be burned in the open air, just like the writing board Du Mingna was making now.

 In addition to the open-air kiln, there were also dug kilns and kilns built with stones and bricks.

 Given the current conditions of Huisheng Village, they could only make open-air kilns, dig pits, or use stones to build kilns.

 But Du Mingna was not sure if using only stones would work.

 The villagers also planned to explore further away from the village.

 Anyway, for these kinds of constructions, as long as there were no people or other things that could attract monsters' attention, there would be no danger.

 They could try slowly.

 If they really made something good, it would be amazing! Du Mingna and the villagers finished burning the clay board, then covered it with a layer of yellow sand.

 He smoothed out the yellow sand.

 Dora blinked her big eyes and solemnly handed a small wooden stick to Du Mingna.

 Du Mingna took it.

 He held the small wooden stick as if holding a pen.

 The tip of the stick was a little distance away from the yellow sand.

 The onlookers, Dora, Old John, and other villagers, all held their breath.

 Everyone was looking forward to Du Mingna's next move.

 Soon, the tip of the stick moved on the yellow sand.

 When Du Mingna wrote the first stroke, the speed was a bit slow.

 He became more and more adapted as he wrote.

 This was much easier than carving words with a knife on a wooden board! In an instant, the three words "Huisheng Village" were written on the writing board.

 Clear traces were left on the yellow sand.

 He stopped writing.

 The onlookers suddenly burst into enthusiastic cheers.

 This cheer even alarmed Gus, Daniel, and others who were returning from the mountain.